Of sooty sweeps, or colliers, and besides,
However the poor elves
Might wash themselves,

Nobody knew if they were clean or not-
On Nature's fairness they were quite a blot!
Not to forget more serious complaints
That even while they join'd in pious hymn,
So black they were and grim,

In face and limb,

They look'd like Devils, tho' they sang like Saints
The thing was undeniable!

They wanted washing! not that slight ablution
To which the skin of the White man is liable,
Merely removing transient pollution-

But good, hard, honest, energetic rubbing
And scrubbing,

Sousing each sooty frame from heels to head
With stiff, strong saponaceous lather,
And pails of water-hottish rather,
But not so boiling as to turn 'em red!
So spoke the philanthropic man

Who laid and hatch'd, and nursed the plan-
And oh! to view its glorious consummation!
The brooms and mops,
The tubs and slops,

The baths and brushes in full operation!
To see each Crow, or Jim, or John,

Go in a raven and come out a swan !

While fair as Cavendishes, Vanes, and Russels,

Black Venus rises from the soapy surge,

And all the little Niggerlings emerge

As lily-white as mussels.

Sweet was the vision-but alas !

However in prospectus bright and sunny,

To bring such visionary scenes to pass

One thing was requisite, and that was—money! Money, that pays the laundress and her bills,

For socks, and collars, shirts, and frills,

Cravats and kerchiefs-money, without which
The negroes must remain as dark as pitch ;

A thing to make all Christians sad and shivery, To think of millions of immortal souls

Dwelling in bodies black as coals,

And living-so to speak-in Satan's livery!

Money-the root of evil-dross and stuff!
But oh! how happy ought the rich to feel,
Whose means enabled them to give enough
To blanch an African from head to heel!
How blessed-yea thrice blessed—to subscribe
Enough to scour a tribe!

While he whose fortune was at best a brittle one,
Although he gave but pence, how sweet to know
He help'd to bleach a Hottentot's great toe,
Or little one!

Moved by this logic, or appall'd,

To persons of a certain turn so proper,

The money came when call'd

In silver, gold, and copper,

Presents from "friends to blacks," or foes to whites,
“Trifles,” and “offsprings," and "widow's mites,"
Plump legacies, and yearly benefactions,
With other gifts

And charitable lifts,

Printed in lists and quarterly transactions.
As thus-Elisha Brettel,
An iron kettle.

The Dowager Lady Scannel,
A piece of flannel,
Rebecca Pope.

A bar of soap.
The Misses Bowels,
Half-a-dozen towels.
The Master Rush's
Two scrubbing-brushes,
Mr Groon.

A stable broom,

And Mrs. Grubb,

A tub.

Great were the sums collected!

And great results in consequence expected.
But somehow, in the teeth of all endeavour,
According to reports
At yearly courts,

The blacks, confound them! were as black as ever!

Yes! spite of all the water soused aloft,
Soap, plain and mottled, hard and soft,
Soda and pearlash, huckaback and sand,
Brooms, brushes, palm of hand,

And scourers in the office strong and clever,

In spite of all the tubbing, rubbing, scrubbing, The routing and the grubbing,

The blacks, confound them! were as black as ever!

In fact, in his perennial speech,

The chairman owned the niggers did not bleach, As he had hoped,

From being washed and soap'd,

A circumstance he named with grief and pity;
But still he had the happiness to say,

For self and the Committee,
By persevering in the present way,

And scrubbing at the Blacks from day to day, Although he could not promise perfect white, From certain symptoms that had come to light, He hoped in time to get them gray!

Lull'd by his vague assurance,

The friends and patrons of the sable tribe
Continued to subscribe,

And waited, waited on with much endurance-
Many a frugal sister, thrifty daughter-
Many a stinted widow, pinching mother-
With income by the tax made somewhat shorter,
Still paid implicitly her crown per quarter,

THE

POETICAL WORKS

OF

THOMAS HOOD.

IN TWO VOLUMES.

VOLUME II.

BOSTON:

LITTLE, BROWN AND COMPANY.

SHEPARD, CLARK AND BROWN.

M.DCCC.LVII.